Dystopian – Page 2 – Marked for Plot

Witchmark – Bikes and Murders with a side of Medicine

I’m not sure why Witchmark languished on my shelf for years. I already know that I love Polk’s writing, and Witchmark was on the forefront of queer content from Tor and Orbit releases right as it was starting to become more commercially acceptable for traditional publishers to put out queer books. It was one of 12 books I committed to read in 2026, and I’m glad I did! It sits in a setting I’ve not read much of (World War I adjacent, time period wise, though not set on Earth), but I think I need more bicycles in my fantasy. I don’t think I loved it quite as much as most others, but I had a great time and will be chasing down the sequels for sure.

The Premise:
Miles has a gift for healing. Unfortunately, his magic doesn’t involve controlling the weather, which means he had to run away from his aristocratic family and fake his own death to prevent his father from turning him into a glorified magical battery for the Storm Singers. He’s now a Doctor who focuses on mental health in a veteran’s hospital. He gets yanked back into his old life when a dying man is brought to him, a man who knows that Miles has magic. And the gentleman who brought that dying man also seems intent on the secrets that Miles has so desperately kept. He needs to solve the man’s murder, lay low, and prevent his sister from binding his freedom to her whims.

Read If Looking For: a story set after the war has ended, an oppressive oligarchy that hits a bit too close to home, grounded and messy sibling dynamics

Avoid If Looking For: a mystery where you put the clues together, deep explorations of PTSD, developed romance arcs

Comparable Media: Howl’s Moving Castle, A Marvellous Light, Full Metal Alchemist

Monkey Meat – An Anticapitalist Fever Dream

I knew nothing about Monkey Meat other than its title and cover art. I didn’t quite know what to make of a hand crushing a Spam-esque can with a monkey on the front, but I knew I was interested in reading more. Monkey Meat: the First Batch is a zany and dark anthology that I fell in love with. It’s not the most original critique of capitalism I’ve seen, but it’s certainly one of the most engaging. I truly believe that if companies could get God to sign over the rights to people’s souls, they would absolutely do so. My only regret is that it doesn’t seem likely to get a sequel, but I will certainly be chasing down more of Juni Ba’s work in the future.

The Premise:
This anthology (though it might be better described as a mosaic comic) focuses on Monkey Meat Island. Once an untouched paradise, it is now ruled by a capitalist megacorporation cranking out questionably sourced meat, energy drinks made out of souls, and action figures showcasing the indigenous cultures the company eradicated to ‘honor’ them. Each story follows a different protagonist, but several characters run through the series, including the enslaved enforcer Lug and the supernaturally persuasive Salesman

Read If Looking For: unbridled creativity, unconventional art styles, episodic structures

Avoid If Looking For: consistent worldbuilding, subtlety and nuance, grounded characters

Comparable Media: Dungeon Crawler Carl, Invader Zim, Rick and Morty

The Memory of the Ogisi – A Haunting Conclusion to the Forever Desert

I’ve been chewing on the Forever Desert Trilogy since 2023. Books that are interested in the art of storytelling are candy for me, and this trilogy takes a different approach than most. I actually use the first book in the Speculative Fiction course I teach to high schoolers. This series benefits from gaps between each book in the series: the way Utomi plays with history in this trilogy works best when your memory of the past book is a little bit fuzzy. I liked the first two books in this series a lot, but this book is by far my favorite of the three. It’s pretty bleak, and probably not for everyone, but it really worked for me.

For reviews of the first two books in this series, see The Lies of the Ajungo and The Truth of the Aleke

The Premise
In this iteration of the Forever Desert, a minor historian departs from The City of a Thousand Stories in search of the famed Tomb of Osi. His journey brings him into contact with historians from other cities in search of other cities. What he finds causes him to rethink his society’s role in the world, and what he brings back sparks the change that will bring The Forever Desert into its next generation of oppression, control, and violence.

Read if: you’re looking for a blend of folkloric storytelling and epic fantasy, you’re interested in darkly thematic explorations of truth, power, and history

Avoid if: you dislike books that lack hope,you want worldbuilding to feel consistent and explainable

Comparable Titles: 1984, A Conspiracy of Truths, The Giver Quartet

The Strength of the Few – An Addictive & Hollow Sequel

The Will of the Many was a bit like fast food. I was unable to put it down, burning through the book in little more than a day. I loved every second of it. Afterwards, I began to notice that the story wasn’t as filling as I thought while reading. I knew I wanted to read the sequel, but I entered with reservations. The Strength of the Few was almost exactly what I thought it would be: fun when little thought was applied, but very difficult to ignore some glaring issues that kept rearing their heads. Will I buy the final installment when it comes out? As with the Pokemon games, my answer is always no. As with Pokemon, I’ll probably break that answer as soon as the book releases and end up disappointed.

While this review doesn’t focus on specific plot points, it will spoil the nature of the twist revealed in the Epilogue of Book 1. This information is also located on the back cover of the book, but I figured I should give a heads up.

The Premise
After going through the gate, Vis is cloned to exist in three worlds. Res (the one we already know), Obiteum (a desert world with not a lot of people, but a lot of necromancy), and Luceum (northern European coded with plenty of druids). He is Synchronous, one of the two to exist in all three worlds at once. He is one of two people who can use the magic of all three realms. And the other? He’s the immortal in charge of the end of the world, and Vis must stop him.

Read if: You want to see Vis keep being awesome in three worlds instead of just one, expansive scope is important to you, there’s even more noble women falling in love with Vis

Avoid if: You were hoping for a political plotline of Vis working from the inside, exploring his moral qualms with Will is important to you

Comparable Titles: Red Rising, The Name of the Wind, Ironbound, Mistborn

Striker V: Elements of Change

This was meant to be a book I read when I was on the treadmill, taking a break from curriculum writing, or when I couldn’t fall asleep. The type of story it didn’t matter much if I drifted in and out of. I was reading it on my cell phone, not even a damned e-reader. Striker V gripped me in the early chapters and didn’t let me go for a good long while. This novel examines Superheroes from a more person-first perspective than the standard, caring just as much about how humans would react to the constant violence of superhero activity as the fights themselves. It didn’t quite stick the landing, and I have some issues with the resolution of the story. However, it did things I haven’t seen much in superhero stories, and those bits felt just as interesting as The Watchmen.

Elevator Pitch:
Striker is the fifth superhero with his name. He’s got seven years until retirement and two years until he reaches his heroic lineage’s average age of death (none have survived to retire). He’s got big muscles, a massive healing factor, and some touch-based mind syncing. He’s been worn down by the constant pain of his existence, the fear that no matter what he does his bones will be ground to dust over and over while the public excitedly waits for him to fall from a skyscraper one more time so that Subway will give away free promotional sandwiches. The shifts have been longer recently with increased villain activity, and the book opens with him in a desperate battle against his best friend in the world, who has just now gone rogue.

Read if Looking For: mental health struggles, governmental bureaucracy (and sometimes humor), dystopian superheroes, happy endings

Avoid if Looking For: nuanced climaxes to nuanced conflicts, creative superhero powers, villains that make sense, tonal consistency

Local Heavens

I came excited for a queer Gatsby retelling, and left disappointed by how it was handled. I’m not a diehard Gatsby fan, but it’s definitely on the higher end of ‘proper English’ books I was forced to read in high school. I think it’s a story with rich potential for reimaginings considering how little the original plot of Gatsby actually matters. However, I left this book wishing almost every choice Fajardo made was a different one. Should I have DNF’d it? Probably, and it’s a lesson for me to learn as I start 2026. Building good habits in the new year and all that.

I won’t give my usual Elevator Pitch here. If you’re familiar with The Great Gatsby, and can imagine it in a fairly typical Cyberpunk setting, you’ve got the gist. If you haven’t read Gatsby, I’d recommend reading that over this in almost every case. If queer characters in cyberpunk worlds is your interest, try Welcome to Forever, and if you want early 1900s Queer Asian leads, try Siren Queen.

Read if Looking For: extremely faithful retellings, casually bisexual protagonists, thieves with bird aliases, Mech-Jazz lounges

Avoid if Looking For: thematic inversions or commentary on The Great Gatsby, lavish Cyberpunk parties

A Rune in the Rubble

One of my goals in 2025 was to read more truly unknown books. Some of my favorite reads have been nearly unknown, and popularity is no indicator of quality. Steven Cavehill’s pitch for his book on r/queersff caught my eye, and I mentally bookmarked it for when I started one of my kindle binges. It’s got some classic high fantasy and dystopia elements, and was a fun read. I’ll definitely pick up the sequel, but I also hope that Cavehill goes through a final round of line-edits on his writing next time around.

The Premise:
Rhys is a city guard relegated to paperwork, much to the disappointment of his noble family. He’s dating the mildly possessive leader of the demon-hunter Rangers, an organization he’s working to join. Ambrose is a half-elf thief desperately trying to buy a better life for his younger brother. The two are on a collision course when Ambrose robs a noble runesmith, accidentally causing the house to burn down and starting a manhunt for him. A manhunt Rune is placed in charge of.

Read if Looking For: asshole families, always another secret, tropey fantasy characters, overly-dependent relationships, notices at the start and end of sex scenes

Avoid if Looking For: polished writing, characters who see the plot coming at them, books free from fantasy racism (elves)

Watchmen

Watchmen has been touted as one of the best comics to come out of all time. Historically, many such novels lauded as ‘all time bests’ in the fantasy and science fiction genres have not lived up to the hype for me. Watchmen however, feels like the real deal. It’s dark and gritty, a take on superheroes that feels more nuanced than other deconstructions of superhero stories I’ve seen (such as Hench, Steelheart, or The Boys, all of which I very much enjoyed). It’s tough to read in a lot of places, and not a story I was interested in binge-reading. However, the juice was absolutely worth the squeeze, and I think it has a lot of important things to say about America and its fascination with superheroes.

The Premise:
This story bounces back and forth in time, but mostly sticks in an alternate version of the 1980s. It follows the lives of superheroes far past their prime, and after the practice has fallen out of style. Woven in between their individual stories (including plenty of flashbacks to the not-so-good old days) is an investigation/conspiracy theory that these former-supers are being targeted , a brewing nuclear war between the US and Russia, and in-universe texts ranging from memoirs to news articles to pirate comics.

Read if Looking For: layers of theme, episodic chapters, cold war stories, low powered supers (mostly), comics that get studied at colleges, epistolary comics

Avoid if Looking For: mindless fun, protagonists who are good people, books free of sexism and homophobia, diverse protagonists

Sky Full of Elephants

Sky Full of Elephants seemed to be making more waves in the literary and general markets than in spec fic corners of the reading community, which is usually a sign that a book probably isn’t for me (though I’ve been proven wrong before). As comparisons to Toni Morrison and Octavia Butler began popping up, however, I knew that I needed to read it. It didn’t live up to those comparisons unfortunately, but it’s a book that’s been lingering in my head. I think it has a heaping plate of flaws, ambitious ideas, and a captivating writing style. There won’t be many readers who have a tepid reaction to this book, which I think is a good sign that it’s speaking to something important.

As a disclaimer, as a white person. I’m not the target audience for this book, which likely affects my perceptions of it. I think people should read books that they aren’t the target audience for, so long as that’s acknowledged. Sky Full of Elephants is written by and for Black Americans, and is very much about Black American joy, history, and hardship.

Elevator Pitch:
When The Event happens, seemingly every White person in America walks into the nearest body of water and drowns themselves. Black Americans have reimagined societal norms. Charlie, previously imprisoned for 20 years, is now a professor. He gets a call from a daughter he never met and drives to Wisconsin. Sidney identifies with the White side of her heritage. She believes in a community of living White folks in Orange Beach. The road trip there takes them through Chicago to a pseudo-magical version of Mobile, which will change them forever.

Read if You Like: books designed to make you uncomfortable, or to challenge your ideas, utopian societies, big twists, ethical dilemmas in books

Avoid if You Dislike: magic with clear and explainable rules, inconsistent character development, weird potshots at walking dogs on leashes, ambiguous endings

Blood over Bright Haven

As one of the few self-published fantasy books to get picked up for a traditionally published reprint, I had high expectations for Blood Over Bright Haven. Its Dark Academia and anti-capitalist themes made me even more excited. It met most of my expectations, and despite wishing it were more avant-garde, I’m happy that I finally got around to this book! Definitely pushes Wang’s other work up on my list. This is a great option for anyone looking to dip their toes into the more political side of genre fiction, as it’s easy to read into parallels with our world. For those already experienced in that type of writing, this won’t blow your mind, but it’s an enjoyable (if standard) entry in that subgenre.

The Premise:
Sciona lives in a city of power and wonder. Protected from the blight that kills indiscriminately outside its magic walls, she seeks to rise past the stereotypes held against women become the first Female High Mage. She knew that sexism would be rampant, but when she’s assigned a janitor for a lab assistant instead of a trained mage, she takes it as a personal challenge. Thomil is a Kwen, one of the tribesmen who live in the Blightlands, and who made the terrible journey to the city; a journey which took all his family except for his (then toddler) niece. Together, they discover the dark secrets of academia, and threaten the very fabric the city rests on.

Read if Looking For: stories about racism and sexism, dark academia, conversations about ethics, light romance elements, engaging narrative voice

Avoid if Looking For: unknowable magic, unproblematic characters, books without sexual assault, surprising twists