As part of the SPFBO (details here) all the bloggers taking part have been assigned 30 books.  By the end of a six month period the aim is to choose one book to put forward into the next stage.  So, I’m aiming to check out 5 books a month.  My list first appears here and I’ve picked and checked out my first batch of five books(post here).  This is my second set of five books, again, chosen randomly.  As previously I’ve provided the write up and covers from Goodreads for background and also to shine the spotlight on each of these books:

1. Greg Little – Unwilling Souls by Greg Little

Ses Lucani has never known her parents. Powerful leaders in the cold war left over after the gods’ imprisonment, Ses’s mother and father are now bitter rivals, each pretending their secret daughter doesn’t exist. Raised by her grandfather, Ses now lives in the hollowed-out center of the planet and learns to forge wrightings, tools imbued with soul energy and used to maintain the prison of the gods. When terrorists attack the prison on her sixteenth birthday, Ses is forced to flee after the ensuing investigation reveals the secret of her parentage. Suddenly, the very parents who abandoned her may be the only people she can trust. Running from government operatives and fanatic cultists, Ses meets Murien, a boy with fingers in a shadowy network that can lead her to her father. But some secrets are darker than parentage. On her way to find her father, Ses will uncover truths about her family and herself that will shatter her understanding of the world and risk the return of the gods themselves.

2. Ash & Flame by Wilson Geiger

The Accord has been broken, the balance of Heaven and Hell shattered.

The war between the armies of Heaven and Hell has been waged on Earth, leaving the world a cracked husk. Humanity clings to life, hidden in the ruins of former cities, seeking refuge from the demons that walk the streets and the angels that soar the darkened skies.

From the mind of Wilson Geiger comes a new series, a frightening vision of the fall of mankind.

Ren and his young daughter, Emma, struggle for survival. When Ren and Emma find refuge at the Haven, a stronghold guarded by the angel Ithuriel and his band of blessed human soldiers against demonic forces lead by Azazel, they may have found the home they so desperately need.

But in the aftermath of the broken Accord, in a world where nowhere is safe, no one can be trusted, and one misstep can lead to death and desolation of the soul, the lines between good and evil blur. Angels cater to their own agendas. Demons wear familiar faces. No one is without a secret. And the dark secrets that Ren and Emma shield from the world and from each other have the power to tip the balance. But in whose favor?

This is the world of Ash and Flame, a dangerous, sinister new place, where survival is more than just staying alive.

3. The Ruling Elite and Other Stories by Xina Marie Uhl & Janet Loftis 

The Ruling Elite and Other Stories is a collection of short fantasy from Xina Marie Uhl and Janet Loftis. Here you’ll find a slave-mercenary struggling to save the life of his mistress, a palace guard defending his city against the destroyer of prophecy, a wanderer who brings more than just past grief into the lives of four sisters, two men who go on a dangerous hunt to kill the witches destroying their village, an outcast trying to outwit the village oracle and get justice for her murdered mother, and a captain who discovers how high the cost is to return the dead to their rightful homes.

Come read stories which fuse fantasy with history and anthropology by two of XC Publishing’s most talented writers.

4. Vergence by John March

Ebryn has trained as a caster from a young age. He sets out to find a place for himself, travelling to Vergence city, where he hopes to be accepted amongst his own kind.

But Ebryn doesn’t know he carries a dangerous secret with him. A secret which threatens to overturn the delicate balance between the factions vying for dominance in the city, the heart of a great trading empire.

Orim, a skilled warrior, is sent by the ruler of Vergence to discover the truth. Opposing Orim is a deadly assassin, tasked with permanently burying the past.
As the struggle for control of the city starts to unfold Ebryn finds he’s not the only one with a hidden history.

5. Loose Changeling by A G Stewart

When Nicole catches her husband in bed with another woman, she doesn’t just eject him from the premises—she turns his mistress into a mouse.

It’s not as if she meant to. Far as she knew, she was regular-issue human. So she’s mystified (and mortified) when Kailen, Fae-for-hire, shows up on her doorstep the next day, hits on her, and then drops this bomb: she’s a Changeling, a Fae raised among mortals. The doorways between the Fae and mortal worlds have been sealed shut for a millennium, but now are opening randomly at an alarming rate, and mortals are turning up dead. Kailen’s employers believe she’s the only one who can close them.

Nicole would be happy to oblige and get her life back to normal, but she’s developed a magical block. Not only does she fail to turn her husband’s mistress back into a human, she can’t do any magic unless she’s angry–and she’s only angry enough when her husband’s in the room. Before Nicole can say “I don’t believe in fairies,” she’s jumping between the Fae and mortal worlds with her soon-to-be-ex, his mousy mistress, and the Fae bodyguard she’s increasingly attracted to, trying to figure out who’s opening the doorways and why.

And she’d better stay mad and learn how to use her powers quickly, because there’s a price on her head. Any magic a Changeling performs cannot be undone by another Fae, so the Fae have a simple rule for those like Nicole—kill on sight.