It’s the end of the year again which means I’ve been thinking a lot about my favorite books I’ve read this year. I’m going to do a giveaway of four of my favorite books from this year (new copies, that is, not mine – no way am I parting with these ones!). New giveaways will be announced on each Saturday in December with a deadline of 11:59 PM of the following Saturday for entering. Winners will be announced the day after the deadline.

This week’s book is Melusine, the first book in Sarah Monette’s The Doctrine of Labyrinth series (review). All three books in this series about the wizard Felix Harrowgate and the assassin Mildmay are excellent with exceptionally well developed characters, but my favorite is actually the second book The Virtu (my #1 favorite book of the year). I liked Melusine almost as much, though, and that’s definitely the place to start, so that’s my choice for giveaway #1! Plus Monette did an amazing job of writing from the first person perspective of an insane character in this particular book.

Warning: I would not recommend this book to anyone offended by bad language, rape, sexual content, and/or homosexuality. Monette is one of those authors that writes by asking herself what the worst possible thing she can do to her characters is and then does it – so it’s not a light, happy story but is rather dark.

Edit: I am changing this contest to any book in the series. So if you already have Melusine and want The Virtu, you can choose to get The Virtu instead. Or if you have both but don’t have The Mirador, you can get that one if you win.

Contest Rules

To enter, send an email with the subject “Melusine” to fantasycafe AT novomancy.org. Please include your mailing address. Addresses will only be used for sending the book out quickly and all messages will be deleted once the contest is over. If you already have this book but want either The Virtu or The Mirador, please specify which of these two books you would like instead.

The contest is open to anyone. One entry per person is allowed.

Entries for the contest will be accepted through 11:59 PM on Saturday December 13. The next contest will be announced sometime that day.

Good luck!