Remember those late nights spent under a pillow fort?

Making friendship bracelets and boondoggle, braiding hair and talking about who liked who. When the highest stakes of your life laid in a round of truth or dare. When giggles had to be hushed and staying up past midnight felt like entering a new dimension.

Today we’re talking slumber parties.

We read books for adventure. We read books for escape. We read books for… the tropes.

I’m not here to yuck your yum (or to yum your yuck for that matter), but some of these tropes are getting out of hand. FMCs can’t swing a sword these days without hitting a shadow daddy with it.

All of this is to say, there are some tropes that even I’m getting sick of. But I’m a solutions guy! So here are some of the tropes I want to see more of in fantasy novels, and a couple books that actually knock them out of the park. Stick around ’til the end for an extra special look at a few things I’m hating on right now as well.

It’s officially summer, which means it’s officially time to dust off our favorite summer fantasy reads.

We know what you’re thinking—spring courts and love triangles and MMCs with long blond hair. That’s where you, reader, are mistaken. This isn’t a Pantene commercial. This is much more serious.

Don’t get us wrong, we love a good field of wildflowers. But we like our summer reads mysterious and surprising and, honestly, a little dark. Save the formulaic stories for Christmas movies. We’re ready for a villain who isn’t just a nice boy with selfish intentions.

As reader girls & femmes ourselves over here at Forest & Fawn, we know no two summer readers are alike. 

Some are beach readers—the girls who need a paperback to fold up and dog-ear and fill the pages with sand. Others are camp girlies—you guys need something that can go from campfire to hammock to tent to the bottom of your multicolor Cotopaxi backpack without looking (too) battered by the end of the week.  Then there’s AC chic babes—for you, something to warm you up in your 65° apartment. 

No matter your summer-girl archetype, we have the perfect fantasy novels for your TBR.

You’ve officially finished the infamous A Court of Thorns and Roses series by Sarah J. Maas.

Congratulations! And, my condolences.

Because how could you ever move on? This series had it all: an enchanting magic system, the most wholesome found family, multiple shadow daddies, and, most importantly, so many enemies-to-lovers plots it’s hard to remember which of our favorite pairs didn’t start as enemies.

Whether it’s your first read through or your 10th, there’s something special (read: harrowing) about the post-ACOTAR book hangover. Fret not, my faerie-loving friend. I am here to remind you that there are more good books in the world. Better yet, there are more enemies to lovers fantasy books to read after ACTOAR.

Consider these recommendations your cup of coffee to shake off the book hangover and get you out of that end-of-series slump, at least until we get ACOTAR Book 6 in October.