The Happy Place 5: New Beginnings

The Happy Place 5 is a monthly series where a few friends and I post 5 of our favorites books for a certain topic or theme. The name is from a Discord group that I am a part of. We created the space to have a positive environment for a handful of close friends. All of us are bookworms, and many of us are bookstagrammers and bloggers, so we decided to start a blog post series together! I’ll link my friends blogs and posts for this month’s topic at the end of this post.

Welcome to the February edition of The Happy Place 5! This month we are talking about new beginnings. By this we mean new/upcoming releases that are the first book of a series, or first books in a series that you have and want to start. I am choosing to do upcoming releases, since I just recently posted a list of series I own. I’m really bad at keeping track of new releases to be honest, BUT!! I did have quite a few already on my list that sound absolutely incredible. So here they are!

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The Infinity Courts

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This is a young adult science fiction novel about a girl who dies and finds herself in a place where human minds go when they die. But plot twist, the Siri equivalent in this world is planning to take over all this afterlife! This book deals with technology, grief, love, and humanity. And! I think it features an Asian protagonist! It releases on April 6th.

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The Jasmine Throne

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This is an ownvoices queer Indian-influenced fantasy novel about a captive princess and her maidservant (who has magic!!!). They set out to take the throne from the princess’s brother (who has had her exiled and imprisoned). I haven’t read anything by this author yet, but I am super excited to since I’ve heard wonderful things. And damn this one sounds badass. It releases on June 8th!

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She Who Became the Sun

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Goodreads describes this as “Mulan meets The Song of Achilles” which means HELLO?? INJECT IT INTO MY VEINS!!!! This is a reimagining of the rise of the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty. One of the protagonists is genderqueer, and there are m/m, f/f, and other queer relationships. Queer alternate history BUT WITH FANTASY?? Wooohoooooooo!! This one releases on July 20th.

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A Psalm for the Wild-Built

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Becky Chambers wrote the incredible science fiction series called Wayfarers (the first book is A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet). This is an upcoming novella that will kick off the “Monk & Robot” series. It is set in Earth’s future. In the past, robots gained self awareness and wandered into the wilderness, and it has been centuries since anyone has seen one. But one day, a robot comes back and upends the life of a tea monk. Ummmm yes. I need this. I need the whole series immediately actually. The novella releases on July 13th.

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Son of the Storm

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This is an upcoming fantasy novel that is all about forbidden magic, and is inspired by the pre-colonial empires of West Africa. A scholar’s life is changed when out of the blue a warrior turns up from a place that supposedly doesn’t exist. And the magic that she has isn’t supposed to exist either!! This sounds so great and I’m really excited for more African inspired fantasy. It releases on May 11th.

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Sadly I’m going to have to wait a few months to read any of these lol but STILL!!!! The excitement is real. Have you heard any of these? Are you excited for any other series starters coming out this year?

Other Happy Place 5 posts:

• Crini @ Crini’s