Of the options for this week, the theme is “Top Ten Debut Authors Who Have Me Looking Forward To Their Sophomore Novel” or “Top Ten Sophomore Novels That I Loved Just As Much If Not More As The Author’s Debut”. Because I’m fickle, I’m going to do this one somewhat randomly based on both prompts.

1. Pacific Fire, Greg van Eekhout. I wasn’t sure about California Bones, but Pacific Fire won me over and I just had to get Dragon Coast.
2. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien. I mean, The Hobbit was okay, but I think it’s The Lord of the Rings that really cemented Tolkien’s reputation.
3. Moon Over Soho, Ben Aaronovitch. Every subsequent book has made me more of a fan of the series.
4. Crown of Midnight, Sarah J. Maas. I wasn’t sure if I was into the series until I read Crown of Midnight.
5. Red Seas Under Red Skies, Scott Lynch. I loved The Lies of Locke Lamora, and I wasn’t sure if Lynch could keep it up. He could.
6. The Wrong Goodbye, Chris F. Holm. I was worried the second book would be too much like the first, that the fun wouldn’t hold out. It did!
7. Huntress, Malinda Lo. I liked this waaaay more than Ash.
8. The Blasted Lands, James A. Moore. This is a second book that I’m looking forward to. I know it’s out and has been a while. Shush. I’m behind.
9. Jacqueline Koyanagi. There’s gonna be more after Ascension, right? Right??
10. Seth Dickinson. Gimme more Baru!

I’m really bad at keeping track of debut authors and so on, so I’m gonna be interested to see what other people have come up with this week. Maybe I’d better keep some paper at the ready for taking notes…