I have a weakness for a cosy sort of fantasy that doesn't take itself or the genre too seriously but does treat it with affection and respect. It started with Terry Pratchett at a formative age and has been reignited by the current vogue for this particular subgenre. Some books have been better than others, Long Live Evil, which I listened to while knitting surprised me with how much I liked it. It doesn't do anything particularly new, but it does it much better than a few other examples I can think of.
Rae is a 20 year old woman dying of cancer with pretty much only her younger sister by her side. Het father abandoned the family when the going got to tough, and her mother is too busy working to try and pay medical bills (it is an American book). Her friends have moved on and it's all fairly bleak, when one day a mysterious woman tells her she can have a second chance in her favourite book series - if she retrieves a mystical flower in the book she'll be cured in her own world.
It sounds like nonsense, but what do you do but humour a mysterious stranger, even on your deathbed. So nobody is more surprised than Rae when she wakes up in Time of Iron, as a villainess. Unfortunately, she never really read the first book in the series properly, it was her sister's favourite first, becoming something they shared. She's listened to her sister read it to her, but not very closely so there's a lot of very hazy detail.
Even more unfortunately she does remember that the character she's currently inhabiting is due to be executed the next day, but Rae isn't going to give up on her second chance so easily no matter what it does to the plot - which spins further and further away from her.
Chaos ensues. Sarah Rees Brennan is transitioning from YA to adult here, and does it well. She interrogates fandom and it's obsessive nature, but with enough good humour to see the good as well as the bad in it. She has fun with her characters and discusses some reasonably dark themes, but avoids smut - this wouldn't be inappropriate for her younger audience to read. I found this one fun and look forward to book two and seeing where she takes her story next.
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