Author Spotlight: Tamora Pierce book guide!

If any of you follow me on Instagram, I’m sure you have heard me talk about Tamora Pierce at one point. If you somehow missed that or don’t follow me on Instagram, then here’s the gist of what I say when I talk about her: “SHE’S MY FAVORITE AUTHOR YOU HAVE TO READ HER BOOKS!” She’s written a lotttt of books, and started back in 1983, when YA was barely a category of books. I feel like she is one of the pioneers of YA, and especially of female young adult heroes. Since she has so many books out (and in the same universe) a lot of people have asked me where the best place to start is. I thought I’d make a little guide to help with that! And to hopefully convince you to read her books 😈

My friend Sakina (@aforestofbooks) did a similar post quite a while ago, so feel free to check hers out here.

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How did I get started reading Tamora Pierce?

Okay, MAJOR shoutout to my mom here. Both she and my dad are huge readers, which is the reason I’m such a big reader. My dad prefers mysteries and thrillers, action/adventure type stuff, whereas my mom reads more broadly. In particular, she’s a pretty big fantasy fan. She bought Tamora Pierce’s books back in the day, and by that I mean when the first ones were just coming out! So she started me on my journey. THANKS MOM I love you 🙂

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Why should you read Tamora Pierce?

BECAUSE SHE’S AMAZING?? Okay no but for real. Let me break it down for you. You want badass female warriors? She’s got them. You want clever girls who plot and scheme? She’s got them. You want loud confident girls? Got em. Quiet shy girls? Got em. Tall, short, fat, nonwhite, lesbian. She’s written all of those as her main characters. Heroes with magic? YEP. Heroes without magic? YEP.

Speaking of magic, there are different kinds of magic. “The Gift” which is pretty standard and covers everything from healing (humans only though) to disguising to battle magic. And then there’s wild magic – which is sooo cool. Basically it’s a bond with animals! If you have strong magic, you can talk with them, heal them, and other COOL STUFF that I don’t want to spoil.

There are also a lot of animal characters that are important friends to the main characters, which like, who doesn’t love that?

Another great thing – she is one of the very few authors that I can think of that actually discuss women getting their period!! I think this is really important to normalize in books, since it’s a normal thing in real life.

Her books are written in two different universes, the Tortall universe and the Emelan universe. The Tortall books are the most well known, but I love the Emelan books as well!

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The Tortall Universe

Tortall is the name of the country that is generally the main location of her books in this universe. In some, the characters travel to other countries on their adventures, and in one series the main character is from Tortall but the books take place almost entirely in another country. Tortall itself seems to be inspired by the Middle Ages – we have a standard political structure of kings, queens, lords, ladies, barons, dukes, etc, and knights that form the military part of the country. The neighboring countries are inspired by various countries and cultures, Sarain and those countries seem to be inspired by Nepal and Tibet, the Yamani Islands are inspired by Japan, and etc. I love that as she writes more books she explores more of these different lands.

1. Tortall universe series:

So which series are the ones set in this world? In publication order, they are:

1. The Song of the Lioness quartet (Alanna: the First Adventure, In the Hand of the Goddess, The Woman Who Rides Like a Man, Lioness Rampant)
2. The Immortals quartet (Wild Magic, Wolf-Speaker, Emperor Mage, The Realms of the Gods)
3. Protector of the Small quartet (First Test, Page, Squire, Lady Knight)
4. Daughter of the Lioness duology (Trickster’s Choice, Trickster’s Queen)
5. Beka Cooper trilogy (Terrier, Bloodhound, Mastiff)
6. The Numair Chronicles (trilogy) – in progress (Tempests and Slaughter, +2)

The in-universe chronological order is slightly different:

1. Beka Cooper trilogy
2. The Song of the Lioness quartet
3. The Numair Chronicles (trilogy) – in progress
4. The Immortals quartet
5. Protector of the Small quartet
6. Daughter of the Lioness duology

The Song of the Lioness quartet

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This is probably my favorite series of all the Tortall books. It’s the first one I read, and I feel it’s underrated. The first book starts with Alanna and her twin brother Thom switching places. Originally, Alanna is being sent to the convent to learn skills befitting a court lady, and Thom is being sent to the palace to train as a knight. However, Alanna really wants to be a knight (though girls aren’t allowed) and Thom wants to be a sorcerer, and young boys are trained in sorcery at the convent. So they decide to switch! Alanna disguises herself as a boy and goes to the palace to train to become a knight. Alanna is fierce, short-tempered, has magic, and she’s got purple eyes! She’s my favorite TP hero. The series follows her journey to become a knight. She remains disguised as a boy the whole time she is training (obviously).

I will say that this reads as more of a MG/YA novel rather than YA. You can tell it’s Pierce’s first books, as the writing I think is weaker than her other books. I love it nonetheless, and I still think the story is amazing. They are also quite short, and she had originally written this as one whole novel so I guess that’s another thing you could keep in mind.

The Immortals quartet

Daine is a young girl who wants to leave her homeland, and gets hired by a woman who is the horsemistress for the Queen’s Rider’s in Tortall. Daine has a “knack” with animals, they seem to speak to her and she can understand them better than most people. It turns out she has wild magic! She begins to learn about her magic and develop her skills, and of course hijinks ensue along the way. The main theme of this series is the return of “immortals” to Tortall (hence the series title). These are creatures that aren’t “natural,” creatures such as centaurs, griffins, creepy things called Stormwings, ogres, hurroks, etc. After the setup of a pretty standard world in Song of the Lioness, I really loved this expansion of the universe!

Protector of the Small quartet

THIS QUARTET whew. Easily my second favorite series of these. The main character in this series is a girl named Kel, who wants to be a knight. Since this takes place after the Song of the Lioness series, the laws have changed so girls are now allowed to become knights. However, none have actually tried until Kel comes along. She is kind of an outsider, having spent most of her childhood in a different country (the Yamani Islands – similar to Japan). She’s tall, quiet, and stands up to every bully she comes across. There are amazing friendships in this series, and so many great characters! The series follows her journey to become a knight, but it is very different from Alanna’s. Kel is very much an everyday person, which is great after reading a lot of YA with the “chosen one” trope.

Daughter of the Lioness duology

I guess minor spoiler for Song of the Lioness since this is called Daughter of the Lioness – clearly Alanna doesn’t die at the end of that series haha. This duology follows Aly, Alanna’s daughter. She is amazingly clever, bold, and brave, and vehemently does not want to follow her mother’s footsteps to become a knight. She has a huge argument with her mom, and runs away. She ends up getting captured and is sold as a slave in the Copper Isles, another country off the coast of Tortall. She ends up getting swept up in a rebellion of the indigenous people against the current rulers. I went back and reread this recently and loved it even more. Aly is more of a schemer than a warrior, and it’s fun to read about a hero with different skills than just fighting.

Beka Cooper trilogy

This book is set about 200 years before the Song of the Lioness quartet and follows Beka Cooper, who is the ancestor of a character introduced in the Song of the Lioness. She is training to be a Provost’s Guard, which is essentially like a police force. The knighthood is the military force for nobles, whereas the the guard is for commoners. Beka has a special brand of magic – she hears whispers on the wind, whispers that are the voices of the dead. In the first book, she is a rookie working with two older guards and they uncover a new crime boss in the capitol city. I love the friends that Beka makes in this series, both human and nonhuman. This series is also a bit different from the others in that it is written in a first person journal form, which was fun to read.

The Numair Chronicles (trilogy)

So we’ve had all female main characters but now, we have a male main character! Numair is Daine’s magic teacher from the Immortals quartet, and this trilogy follows his backstory (so is set before the Immortals). Only the first book has been published so far, and it follow Numair – who was born Arram – as he starts at school to learn magic. He has a very close knit group of two other friends, Varice and Ozorne. I can’t say too much since some of the events in the Immortals will tell you things about this series, but it was really good!! I can’t wait for the next two to come out.

2. Reading order:

My recommendation for reading order is the publication order (the first list in section 1). This is for two reasons. One, her writing really gets better with each book/series, so I think reading them out of publication order could be a bit jarring. Two, in her later books she has little details that are callbacks to series she wrote earlier, so reading in publication order is more fun since you can recognize and enjoy those bits.

Reading in this order means you read the Immortals quartet before Numair’s books, which means you know the fate of some of the characters in Numair’s books. I think this just makes the book more emotional, and keeps you wondering what happens to make things turn out how they do.

3. Misc:

Look at my Tortall ladies!!!! I love them 🙂 (from left to right: Alanna, Daine, Kel, Aly, Beka).

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The Emelan Universe

The other universe of Tamora Pierce’s books is the Emelan universe. Again, Emelan the country where pretty much all of the first series takes place, and some of the following books as well. The magic in this world is more elemental than in the Tortall universe. The most common kind of magic is similar to that of Tortall, and children typically show signs of this more “academic” magic in things such as magic balls of light appear, seeing things in the fire, etc. It involves a lot of rigorous study and spells and all that jazz. There is also the more elemental magic that is connected to weather, fire, plants, stone, cooking, etc. They have names for this in the books I believe but I’ve just forgotten the terms. There isn’t much formal study for this kind of magic, and it’s more rare and often goes unnoticed.

1. Emelan Universe series:

In publication order, the books are as follows:

1. Circle of Magic (Sandry’s Book, Tris’ Book, Daja’s Book, Briar’s Book)
2. The Circle Opens (Magic Steps, Street Magic, Cold Fire, Shatterglass)
3. The Circle Reforged (The Will of the Empress, Melting Stones, Battle Magic)

Circle of Magic

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This series follows four misfit kids as they are taught to use their magic. At first none of them fit in where they are (at home, at the temple school, etc), and so they are all brought to live in the same cottage together with two older women as their guardians. It turns out they all have a special kind of magic. Sandry is a noble girl of very high rank who has magic with weaving and thread. Tris is a girl from a merchant family and has very strong weather magic, she can control the tides, winds, rain, etc. Daja is a survivor of a tragedy that killed her family, and made an outcast for it. She has metalworking magic. Briar is a former thief who is saved from sentencing at the last minute and brought to the temple cottage. He is very gifted with plant magic. Over the course of the series the four of them work on controlling their magic and thwarting dangerous plots, and they become extremely close friends in the process.

The books follow the kids when they are quite young, around 11-12 years old, so this quartet reads more like a middle grade. Don’t let that turn you away! They’re amazing (and diverse!).

The Circle Opens

This quartet takes place post-Circle of Magic, after the kids have all gotten their magical medallions (saying they’re masters, etc). They each go out in to the world with their specific teacher/mentor, and travel to different places. Each book follows one of them, and in each one they actually mentor their own student! In these, the group of kids are older now, in their teens so it’s definitely a YA series. I loved these ones, since they’re more complex and the students they mentor have really interesting magic. It’s cool to see the fleshing out of the magic system in this universe. For example, there are stone mages, glass mages, cooking mages, etc. I liked seeing the kids mature between the the two series as well.

The Circle Reforged

These three books are somewhat related to each other in that they all follow the characters from previous books, but they are less connected to each other and I would call them more of a collection of novels set in the same universe rather than a cohesive series.

Battle Magic occurs first, and follows Briar, his mentor, and the student (named Evvy) that Briar picked up in his book in the Circle Opens (Street Magic). It follows them as they are caught up in a war in a neighboring country to Emelan.

Melting Stones happens after Battle Magic, and follows Evvy and Briar’s mentor (Rosethorn) as the two of them travel to a close by island to figure out why all the plant and animal life is dying out on that island. There is a being in this book that is basically a sentient rock so that was pretty neat.

The Will of the Empress is the reason this is called the Circle Reforged, as it brings the original four characters (Sandry, Tris, Daja, and Briar) back together after all of their travels and adventures. Sandry’s cousin is the empress of the neighboring country of Namorn, and Sandry owns lands in Namorn. The Empress has pressured Sandry to visit for years, and finally Sandry can no longer refuse. She is accompanied by her old friends, but they find that after all this time they’ve all grown up and grown apart. When they arrive, they also realize that the Empress has set a trap to keep Sandry and her friends in Namorn, since they are all very powerful mages. The four have relearn how to work together to outwit the Empress and her mages so they may all return home.

2. Reading order:

These books are pretty much chronological, so definitely you should read the Circle of Magic series first, then the Circle Opens series. For the Circle Reforged series, you have two options. You can read them in publication order (The Will of the Empress, Melting Stones, then Battle Magic) or you could read them in in-universe chronological order (Battle Magic, Melting Stones, then The Will of the Empress). I read them in publication order but I don’t really have a strong opinion either way. Both The Will of the Empress and Battle Magic are amaaazing, so ending with either one would be ending on a high note. I will say that some of the events of Battle Magic are referenced in The Will of the Empress, so you may want to read that first. You do you!

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Fun for those who have already read Tamora Pierce

I thought I’d include some funny images/memes/etc I found that I think fans will find funny 🙂 for those who haven’t read the books, you might not understand them (hopefully you will in the future… 🙂 ) but they’re not spoiling anything! Enjoy!

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The end!

I hope you enjoyed my rather thorough introduction to Tamora Pierce! Let me know if any of you have read her books, or if I’ve convinced you to give them a try :). Message me anytime!! I need more fellow fans to chat with.