Introducing Fantasy FanReads: Cozy Corner with Lexi

0:00With no fees or minimums on checking accounts, it's no wonder the Capital One Bank guy is so passionate about banking with Capital One. If he were here, he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums. He'd also talk about how most Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends, it's pretty much all he talks about. In a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply, see capital one dot com slash bank capital one and a member FDIC. Howdy howdy ho and welcome to fantasy fanfellas. I'm Hayden producer of the fantasy fangirls podcast and your resident lover of all things sanderson and i'm steven your bookish internet goofball but you can call me the smash daddy and we are currently deep diving Brandon sanderson's fantasy epic misborn but here's the catch steven here has not read misborn before that's right hey hey so each week you'll get my unfiltered raw reactions to every single chip and along the way we'll do character deep dives magic explainers and steven will even try to guess what's next spoiler alert he'll be wrong news flash i'm never wrong episodes

1:05come out every Wednesday and you can find fantasy fanfellas wherever you get your podcasts hey there how are you welcome to the fantasy fan reads podcast where we gather as friends to chat about our shared love of all things reading i'm Jess an avid lifelong reader and lover of cozy conversations so go ahead and grab yourself a cup of something wonderful and come on in today is the very first episode of the fantasy fan reads podcast oh that couldn't be more thrilled to be joined by lexie from fantasy fangirls who is ready to gush about all things cozy fantasy with me how the heck are you doing today lexie i am so good i am so excited to be here for our very first episode i'm so excited to sit down here with you Jess and just be part of this oh my gosh if you listen to or follow the fantasy fangirls you know that lexie is a huge fan of cozy fantasy

2:06which is something we have in common so i'm super thrilled to have her with me today yes and it's so funny because like especially in our discord there's a thing where it's like oh lexie's cozy corner and i'm like we're gonna be doing something and i get to do it with Jess you hear one fantasy fan reads and yeah here's our cozy corner it's finally here i know it's like fate brought this moment together it really is yes just a quick heads up as we get started this episode will be spoiler free for the books we are discussing but feel free to grab something to take notes with because we have some awesome recommendations for you also fantasy fan reads is the newest podcast in the fantasy fangirls media network and as a new show your support means the world please give us a follow at fantasy fan reads on social media rate and review the podcast and come on spread the word to your friends that's what helps us the most plus if you want to help support every show under the fantasy fangirls media network you can join the fantasy fan club for exclusive content early access and ad-free episodes live q and a's book club private discord community events and so much more

3:07go on over to fantasyfangirls.com slash fan club for more information about the fantasy fanatics and deep divers tiers and benefits where you get all show access so excited i know i know and i also cannot believe the show is like part of those tiers oh my gosh you could get early access to this tube just saying yes fantasy fan reads emerge 20% off on it too i know everybody's gonna need a mug to listen to that some just saying oh oh you know i have my my old morning tea here my mug too lexie i have fresh hot chocolate oh that sounds lovely lexie have a couple questions for you that love to ask everyone who joins me here in this little cozy corner of the internet first and foremost i'm curious what are you reading right now we know some of the things you're talking about on fantasy fangirls but but well let's see here i am right now reading finishing up kingdom of ash at the time of this recording Nicole and i are going to be finishing up our fantasy fan guides for that thrown of glass series here in a few days besides that because of course

4:12that is a wonderful book but it also is a lot i've been reading the baby dragon cafe which is absolutely lovely and then of course right after that i'll be reading winemoon hatch and i'm also excited to read the book of astral but back to the cozy part is the baby dragon cafe yes you had me at baby like like you could have said like the baby bunny bookshop and i would have signed me up sounds lovely too i know honestly get on that what are you reading right now i am reading at the again at the time of this recording i'm reading the way of kings by Brandon sanderson which is the first book in storm light archive and i have coined the term i am fast-affused fascinated and confused at the same time i don't think Brandon sanderson bought a vowel in that book it's just all consonants i mean i'm i sound like you could use a cozy fantasy too to break it up a little bit i honestly could i really could so i'm excited to hear some of the other things that you've enjoyed as we dig in today yes yes definitely all right you mentioned you have

5:14tea in your mug is that your go-to warm beverage sometimes it's more of my afternoon hot beverage in the mornings i love my coffee and besides that sparkling water i'm a big sparkling water person too oh i would have never considered sparkling water in the like this is like my cozy comfort drink it is it's because i'm not a big water drinker i know i should be but that's my way of cheating to make myself feel good and joyful about it and all of that but besides that oh my gosh i love tea i also fun fact i drink my coffee black i don't like it very sweet or okay sugar or milk and tea or anything yeah oh my god well we can't share coffee and that's gonna be okay that's gonna be okay because i want mine to taste like a candy bar what are you drinking right now i'm drinking hot chocolate right now which i guess technically chocolate has caffeine but like i'm not gonna have coffee at it's like five o'clock like i guess but i do like two p.m. yeah yeah all morning long though i drink a lot of coffee it's

6:20definitely my go-to you mentioned that some of your beverages bring you joy but i'm curious what about reading brings you joy because that's what i want to get at the core of here today the joy of cozy fantasy in general but what brings you joy with reading there's gonna be several parts to this year so first of all i've always just loved being able to fall into another world especially that's why fantasy is really near and dear to me is i love how people are so creative and they create these amazing worlds that i get to experience and that is just that brings me so much joy that like again that i get to fall into these worlds and it's so creative and just magic and i just get to like live out i see these fantasies but just it's magical like that's the word i just kind of keep coming back to here and also the characters like i absolutely love a relatable character and especially when there are journeys i feel similarly or i'm going through a similar figuring out who

7:21i am sort of thing and i really just love always love that and i think over all the rather than just what's on the page that brings me joy is the way that we as readers are experiencing reading together more so lately i think that social media in particular of course has been huge with that but reading has always been such an independent thing that we do and yet it's these stories that connect us and this shared not just interest but these shared journeys that we are all going on together and different interpretations and it's just so much fun to experience this with such a wonderful community who has these same passions and that really and truly has been the best part of reading that i wasn't expecting when i really got back into it was to be able to surround myself with so many people i used to feel very alone when i was younger about how much i loved fantasy and all of that it wasn't a cool thing and now it is the cool thing it is so much fun and

8:26just all of us seeing the collective joy is really meaningful that is so true i've even felt that way as an adult lexie like i went through a small phase like i'd say maybe in like my 20s where i was reading fantasy novels and like you're at work or somewhere and people like what are you reading you're like yeah do i really want to try to explain the plot of that book to this person is gonna be like well i read a memoir yesterday you know exactly yes right and i realized i shouldn't have been embarrassed period like love what you love and own it proudly but you're right having a community of people who gets it when you say like the unicorn was really cool is so fun exactly and connection is just so important now i feel like more than ever especially in this digital age and for us to be all able to come together like that i think is really beautiful it really is and i feel like cozy fantasy really lends itself to that right because not only do you get those elements of fantasy but you get that warm hug at the same time that so many of us are craving like in the world in which we now live speaking of cozy fantasy lexie can you think back like what book

9:30or author got you into that specific fantasy sub genre yes so it was actually i'll say fairly recently about what eight months ago now or so i read the spell shop by Sarah Bethdirst and so that was my first real cozy fantasy and i didn't even realize that i needed that book until i read it because i'm reading a lot of as many of us do very high stakes action packed emotionally wrecking journeys that we love so much and as much as i appreciate those books i was recognizing just like i felt my mood felt unregulated and like i was just like in this very constant state of anxiety and just kind of like oh and i'm already like that but i was actually like that i laughed because i relate so hard and i was like i think that something like because i'm reading and it's only making it go kind of up even more so i was like i need something to

10:32bring me down a little bit and i just picked up this book that my friend Lauren of book huddle had mentioned and i absolutely fell in love with it it was so calming and it was still absolutely keeping my interest and all of that and i was like oh my gosh this is what my what my heart needed like this i'm not overstimulating i keep coming back to this we're regulating my mood my emotions and that is just when i fell down the cozy fantasy rabbit hole yeah i mean i think as readers we so often are almost like empathic with our characters and when characters we really care about are in truly perilous situations even though we know they are just words on a page you can't help but like clench you know yeah exactly and instead of like with cozy fantasy it's kind of like instead of sucking in a breath as you open the page where it's like okay let's prepare myself what's next and instead it's like a okay what's next you know it's very different yeah and i really think it gives those authors a chance to

11:36make things character focused in a different way because we're getting to know their character through totally different stakes or situations compared to how they respond to like traditional high stress maybe exactly exactly yes that's more inner conflict versus exterior conflict right yes that's awesome i'm a huge fan of Sarah Beth Durst as well and the whole spell shop world that she's creating is just so perfect so fun yes enchanted greenhouse is another one that i love i'm so excited for the third book to be coming out here soon too sangu mandana is another one of my absolute favorite cozy fantasy authors i think she balances a beautiful message with a relatable FMC so well she just weaves in this whimsy in the modern world and found family and the romance too like i think she sticks the landing every book that i've read of hers too and i love those yeah now that i heard you say that about like how it's in the modern world but it's still fantasy and it's

12:40relatable i'm thinking about one of the characters in her book that was a skeleton chicken you know exactly who i'm talking about and and if you haven't read this book i'm not spoiling it i promise but go read it i swear to you i believed that we could all have skeleton chickens because the rest of the book felt like it could have been down the street from me exactly exactly it's like peering over my neighbors like do they have a zombie chicken here baby you know i'm not here to judge i find myself obsessed with the cozy fantasy that has leaned into baking like my first cozy fantasy book was legends and lattes by Travis Baldry yes yes the characters own a cafe and there is a character that bakes in the cafe and i was like i am in i want this cafe to succeed it was just so good and then i recently read a fellowship of bakers and magic by j penner which is if you love great british bake off but you want the people to be fantastical at the same time that is the book for you i will have to read that one because i am such a huge fan of their great british baking show

13:43every it's always airs on Fridays right and Nicole and i have our big recordings every Friday and it's like my treat as after these big recordings i get to shut all of the work things off and i get to enjoy maybe show so good it's so good but it's again it's that same thing you were saying about the different stakes right we get to experience something but it's not war it's just whose cake was best exactly so just delightful that's the word that comes to mind yeah i was thinking a little bit more about what you said about how your body felt reading fantasy compared to cozy fantasy what do you think is maybe still the same or what other things are different between the two in your opinion oh so i think like for instance when i think about a really good cozy fantasy book it's one that like some people might look at cozy fantasy and be like that's just a little bit boring and it's like to me that's not it's like the challenges of everyday people it's not the person who

14:44is going to be going and saving the world but it is somebody who could be your neighbor kind of thing and going through big things that all of us experience in our lives and so i find that there's a certain sense of relatability with cozy fantasies and i go back to like it's not overwhelming or you know you're having to keep five different things straight in your head about who's what who's who and who's where and all the geography and all you know you the usual kind of stuff that goes with fantasy that i love and it's a nice way to a close switch off my brain again like going back to like the big show it's like i i love falling into it and just being taken on this journey it's almost to me like cozy fantasy is a little bit more episodic like if i'm comparing it to tv i can watch a sitcom and still care for those characters and care for those problems but it's a little bit more bite-sized it's like that half an hour and i can walk in i can be okay right versus watching some grand three-hour dramatic movie that i still cared for those characters

15:47but man it was i was in a committed you know like in a different way i mean like a month or so to prepare myself to watch said big yes movie or big tv show or whatever that might be yes exactly and i do love also how cozy fantasies are typically standalone or maybe interconnected where it is more like you're saying bite-sized there and shorter and it's really great pellet cleansers for us one of my favorite elements of cozy fantasy that i think transcends all fantasy is we love a sidekick right and in cozy fantasy i feel like we always get these unique cute little sidekicks so laxie i'm wondering if you were a character in a cozy fantasy book what kind of fun little sidekick would you want like skies the limit oh my goodness i have always loved like the messenger birds i love so much about maybe that's just you know from growing up with headway but i absolutely love when the companion is both fantastical a little bit but still also very

16:52realistic and has a bigger purpose as well too i don't want to say usefulness because that sounds so transactional and it's not like that that's not what i mean at all but it's like that sense of being able to help that's that sense of them be feeling like they can help not just in a story but in that character's life too and so i would love to have like a messenger bird if we're thinking about characters that particularly are in the stories that we've read i mean i keep going back to the spider plant like has this so funny and i just love to that Sarah has said before that she had to make him a spider plant because it was more just the practicality of being able to use them as limbs yeah i just got such a kick out of that oh my gosh that is so funny i love like i love the cozy sidekicks we end up seeing i'm thinking of them right now that are always a like a little grouchy to be there like they kind of happened into the main characters life and i kind of want one of those like the one that like is like yeah i'll do it Jess i'm with you

17:54but like i'm picturing like a angry garden nomax and we dug up outside my cottage and they just like stuck with me now but they would ride or die for me i love that so much yes i also think about kind of going off of that bit of a grumpy but it's like yeah they're stuck with them and they're also a little bit of a wild card like in the magical in keeping book by sargo mandana there is a fox who was turned into a fox and it stuck as a fox and she is the biggest wild card in that book and i absolutely love it love it so good zombie chicken you know i know and i feel like so many of these cozy fantasy authors have done a great job at creating fun sidekicks that maybe never speak either but they speak volumes through their actions and the things that they're doing and like you know them too it's like i don't know it's the magic sauce of the cozy fantasy of telania definitely definitely gotta have the good animal companion or any kind of companion in that i know

18:55i'm loving the authors who are stretching the boundaries of that too like growing up in like the disney renaissance every sidekick was an animal sidekick exactly you know but having ones that are up pack of bones or some plants it's just like so imaginative yes and it goes right back to that element of the magic and whimsy of these books and it's like it's not just cozy but it's creating just like little elements of magic in like the day to day life and part of that is some of these companions and it's just so normal and i love it i love it i love it too i also got into cozy fantasy maybe later than other people who'd known the genre existed and i do think that something that's happening in the book community is a rise in popularity for cozy fantasy or cozy gaming even like thinking back to how just a few years ago animal crossing exploded right or things like stardew valley and i'm wondering your perspective on why do you think we're seeing that rise like cozy fantasy gaining popularity among people who had read typical fantasy previously i mean life

20:01is hard i don't know about there it is but life is hard we're both parents and yeah i had to figure out what the heck's for dinner every night and it's almost taxis and you know just like all the god schedule and other doctor's appointment all of just like i'll say like the normal hard life things the normal adulting things and i think that our generation in particular as millennials like we are tired we are so tired so tired of of a lot of things which also brings me to just the world is scary right now and there's a lot of feelings of unknown and helplessness and spiraling and i know that i felt that a lot and these books are a nice little anchor and i don't i say escapism too but like they're just a little anchor to refuel to to calm myself down to be able to have that regulation and then to be able to once when i set it down again it's like okay then i feel like i can't go out and tackle the world again you know and it's this little break

21:05in the craziness and the chaos of everyday life and the bigger problems and it's so wonderful to be able to do that and then afterward to feel energized and fueled up a little bit and emotionally in a good place to then be able to go okay now i can go do the hard things again so good what do you think yeah i feel that so deeply and i think something that goes with sometimes the state of your own life or the state of the world and that spiraling is it's really easy to forget the good in the world especially when you're not seeing it in the people around you or the events around you and i know these are fictional characters but so many cozy fantasy books remind me that there are helpers and there are good people and that you can have faith that things will work out you might have to put the work in but that there are good people out there because we often see in these books a character maybe with some sort of internal struggle or outside struggle and a found family or people who band together with them or those small acts of kindness that make a huge difference for the main character that we're following along the way and it always

22:08reminds me like those things happen in my life and in the real world also even if that's not right there's still a bigger picture i don't know that reminder is wild to me because you're reading about elves and orcs and all those sorts of things but it feels like a reminder of humanity that is such a good point especially like about whether they're neighbors or like you're saying just like a community of people who are helping one another and who care about one another and we do need that good news and that good intake as well yes to fill ourselves up and to know that it is possible that actually leads me right into kind of something that goes along with this which is in fantasy we're so used to facing a big baddie we're always looking for the villain and the truly like this all this evil evil person in the books and in cozy fantasy we don't often get this truly evil character but we do see our character still struggle what do you think kind of connected to what we're just talking about what are the big baddies we see characters facing cozy fantasy

23:10though i think about internal personal limitations are always a huge one where the main character doesn't think that they are able to achieve something or they're trying to achieve something and it might not be working out and they ended up needing more help that they were afraid to ask for or something like that very again going back to these very real internal problems that we can relate to and connect with there that they're having to go through and there's external situations that bring out where they have to figure that out for themselves in order to succeed for themselves and for their community and i also think too about not just their own personal limitations but also figuring out what they themselves and their community are capable of get think about legends and lattes you know and how wanting to make a coffee shop and it's such a simple low stakes goal for a book you know just all things considered yeah and the little obstacles that come through and the people that come together to make it happen it's so

24:12rewarding to to read and to feel that and to cheer them on and when i think back about like the big bad for instance it can be you know limitations set by oneself as well as from others as well where it's like no like or being put into a box i love when that's almost like the villain where it's like something is expected of someone and they're being put into a box and they're like no like it's them realizing that's not where they belong and they need to be themselves in order to shine the brightest right and i love those stories so much i do too i think totally connected with what you're saying i see like in those limitations almost a lot of characters who are afraid they won't be accepted like they're fighting they're afraid of prejudice or they're afraid that other people are going to see them negatively that happens in a fellowship of bakers and magic because we see our main character is a different race than some of the other characters in the book and they

25:13think that limits them or in the enchanted greenhouse by Sarah Beth thirst we see a character who just thinks that her quirks cannot be accepted like she's not worthy of being loved because of that and the journey that she goes through is the big baddie right like in herself and that hits to the core like as a person who's dealt with that in my own life like what a beautiful story to explore something like that in and be reminded that you can pass those things and you can like defeat the thing and it's just within yourself i think too about the house on the cerulean sea that is one of my absolute favorite books of all time and that one the big bad is kind of like society because of the whole concept of not feeling accepted or not just feeling accepted not being accepted and having to work through that not necessarily with what that means for society but what that means for yourself and for your small community and it's a very powerful message that

26:13hits hard but it's packaged in a warm hug where it does feel like pretty high stakes especially with the message that it is and then at the same time you're able to approach it in a again like the calmer state of mind yeah i don't know i mean i want someone to study this if you're listening to this and you're a psychologist i want to know what's happening in our brains where we still care so much but we're like it's good it's okay it's gonna be okay i'm probably like yeah that's like a general normal life is supposed to be like they're like you should actually study why you don't feel that way okay just kidding psychologists don't die though so i'll get it together oh my gosh well speaking of ourselves if you are a character in a cozy fantasy novel you know not only do you get a sidekick but you get a hobby okay you get your thing okay what is your cozy fantasy characters thing or hobby okay i thought this before i read the very secret society of

27:16irregular witches and that was one of the reasons i loved this book so much potion making i love potion making and it's a little ironic because i do not have any special skill sets with cooking like i definitely need a recipe or my husband is like oh did you come up with this on your own you tried oh yeah and i barely i probably shouldn't be saying this to the teacher but i barely past science class school like i don't know how i got out of my chemistry class like i'm terrible at science a math and so i don't those seem like important skills that would transfer over to potion making so i can't say it would be good at potion making but i tell you i would have a lot of fun with it and i'd probably send my eyebrows off plenty but it would be fun it's so fun magically making things like that it is so funny that you picked something that sounds fun but you don't have the real life skilled back it up because that's exactly where i'm at i want my cozy hobby

28:16to be something artistic like drawing or painting that somehow makes magic like i drew it to exist but my art skills beyond like cartoon stick figures are they're low the bar is low for that cartoon stick figures and they would be wonderful out in society what if my stick figures came to life and were like bop and around whatever cozy town i lived in with the gnome following them that'd be great have you ever watched that one spudged bop episode doodle bob that's all i can think of that well doodle bob is my skill set so that tracks that's that's accurate an evil just doodle bob why am i sending evil into the world black seamer this is a cozy it's a well-meaning doodle just very true very true who would go and unload the dishwasher and all those other things would know what's for dinner girl that is my cozy dream right there that's my fantasy the high stakes are making it from 8 a.m. to a p.m. with doodle just she's got it

29:22truth of that yes oh no we're out of flour for the baking that doodle just has to do what will we do what will we do crisis we call our neighbor it's beautiful they come over it's problem solved yes i love it i love the power of friendship oh my god oh my goodness and then i think about like some of these other the books that we've read like for instance in quick silver there's this character named Wendy in this adorable little village and she makes biscuits and i have a whole cozy fantasy like novella for her i even pitched it to cally heart it's all good she's on board i don't think that she would actually ever do a cozy fantasy but i was so much fun just imagining this world in my head that is such a great one like i think there's kind of that character in every traditional fantasy book that is there and they're thriving but they might do better like at the coffee shop down the road you know that character it's like why are they in this war zone area let's

30:24put them somewhere else you know right like i think of taren from kindred's curse saga i want to pull him right on out of there mainly because i fearful for him and if you've read that trilogy you might feel that in your soul too but i just want to pluck him on out and like send him to go get mimosa's with someone like have brunch or something oh bottomless mimosa brunch just right yes exactly that screams cozy fantasy right there done as someone who's read cozy fantasy and like loves it in your heart because of the way it makes you feel what do you think is like a big lesson you've learned from some of those books or something that you've taken away even if you never read another cozy fantasy novel again oh my goodness so i'm going back to the idea of our own limitations and what we feel is possible and being able to then achieve that and i think that is definitely something big for myself i go back to the magical in keeping book and that one really has a very powerful message

31:29and it about what we are capable of not just like fantastically but just within our own hearts and within ourselves and i go back to what you were saying there about accepting oneself and the more i think about it that is really and truly at the heart of so many of these fantasy books no matter what they're about like i think about legends and lattes and the main character used to be this warrior and now just wants to have a coffee shop and is accepting that is who they are and that they want to live out that dream i even think about i don't necessarily consider a assistant to the villain series like cozy cozy fantasy but has that lighthearted playfulness that i would still kind of consider it a little bit more of like that palette cleanser but that's also the same thing with that accepting of that may character is is so bubbly and fun and has this spunky personality

32:30that everybody around her is learns how to accept and really just love and enjoy and i just love that idea about the heart of everything it really is all about acceptance and embracing quirkiness and understanding our own truths and not letting the others around us who might think differently dictate that because it's our lives and i think that's really powerful man lexie i feel like we had like telepathy today because not only did you steal so much of what i was gonna say but like your answer leads into like the one extra thing i would add on is like a lesson that i have learned and it's what you just were sharing about people's perspectives and i think that in life sometimes we try to bottle down our problems because they don't feel big and we're like other people are dealing with bigger things the world has bigger problems and that is true but it can be simultaneously true that what's happening to you feels big to you and i think cozy fantasy gives us a place to realize that these characters like you said earlier are

33:32not trying to save the world but what they're doing matters to them and you deserve to solve your own problems also right you deserve to fill your own cup among what's happening around you yes you just nailed it and not just that it matters to us but also that it matters to our community too and i think a lot of these books found family is such a centerpiece and it's not just about ourselves accepting us but it's also about reaching out for help and really being open and willing to have those connections with other people as well even if it does feel scary even if it is a little bit outside of our comfort zone at the beginning that at the end of the day the connection propels all of our lives forward you know that is like so beautiful because of what you were saying earlier about how the connection of reading is like what feeds your soul and then in these books it's all about connection like i didn't even plan that i'm gonna tell people you did because

34:36that was just it is we want as humans we crave to be seen we crave each other even when we're feeling introverted you still want people to know you and know you exist and uh so important it really is and i think about to going back to like why this genre is so meaningful for me in my life right now and why it's i think gaining in popularity is so many of us are kind of dealing with some of our own internal conflicts you know and when we read these books again it's not like these crazy high stakes and of course we connect to those very empowering FMCs that we all know and love yeah and there is such a like quite strength in the ones who are a little bit more i'm going to say everyday people and who are having to solve everyday problems and it does still matter and that's a good lesson for us to know as well it's the quiet good you can be quiet good

35:37it's still not and you still have a bright like shining spark you know and you don't know what else you sparked we often see that in these books i'm thinking of a particular thing in a fellowship of bakers and magic you need to go read it so i'm not gonna tell you but like you see these moments where one character's actions impact another character to maybe change course and that is good stuff i love it i love all of it uh i wanted to ask you so i know this isn't so this isn't like technically cozy fantasy but i have i know i just recently got this one here from brand and sanderson called the dress of emerald sea oh yeah is that correctly yeah trust of the emerald sea yeah you got it trust of the emerald sea yes and i thought like is this a good kind of cozy fantasy adjacent i think it is i have not read it yet i know it's part of the greater brand and sanderson caused me here but it is a standalone so you can just kind of read it but i have heard because i am a coffee and mug aficionado that i've been told to read it because

36:42apparently the main character values mugs and apparently i would so see well then i mean who doesn't report back to you i think you should it's on my list but there's kind of when you look up the reading order for these massive series as you know with thrown of glass somebody always has something to say and with the cause mirror lots of somebody's have lots of something to say about when you should read them but i think you could just read i mean just do just do it i think i'll just do it yeah i don't have time to read the storm light archives before i read this book just read it that defeats the purpose of the cozy fantasy huh it does you shouldn't feel the weight upon your shoulders just think about the mugs exactly i also think about like with cozy fantasy the particular time that i am really enjoying it is like right before bed because i'm realizing the older i get the harder it is to turn my brain off when i go to sleep and i love a good book before

37:43bedtime whether that's like listening to my audiobook and doing some coloring or just sitting there with my actual book but i think that cozy fantasy is the perfect transfer from whether it's you know like i'll be working in the evenings or my husband and i will be cleaning up after the craziness with the kiddos or just putting the kiddos down for ton to bed and it's like i need to take a deep breath in and out and i think that is what these books can do so well is it kind of like eases us into bedtime in a way that other books aren't quite able to well it's hard to walk away from the way some other traditional fantasy chapters ended like a cliffhanger and you're like well that's i'm now i've committed to the next chapter you know and cozy fantasy is a little bit easier to say they'll be okay tomorrow we will check on them it's like i trust that they will be okay until tomorrow with the other books i don't always trust that i don't know if they're going to be okay and i have to go right now to check on them i agree because they are going to make poor decisions if i'm not there with them exactly they'll probably still make poor decisions but at least i'll

38:47be there to tell them i told you so i told you so Lexi i got to admit earlier i thought you were gonna say not that it was harder to shut your brain off but it was harder to fall asleep and stay asleep because that's like what i'm experiencing that too i was like i'm trying i got you oh my gosh Lexi before we close up the cozy fantasy part of this conversation because i do have one more sneaky question for you i'm wondering for everybody out there listening what is a cozy fantasy book that you think every fantasy reader should go pick up right now if they haven't already the very secret society of irregular witches i know i've been repeating that a little bit but i love that book so much that in the house on the cerulean sea are two of my all-time favorite books and i don't say that lightly those are awesome recommendations i can like co-stamp those with you they're so good what about you oh i would toss in a third one i feel like i know i said legends in lattes was my kind of first one but the one that told me i'm never exiting this genre was the

39:50spell shop by Sarah Beth Durst there is something in that book that i cannot explain and you have to read it yourself like there's no words to quantify what that book does to your entire self so i would highly recommend it it is so magical and in fact so the spell shop i was so excited when we finally had a book club that had a cozy theme to it it was like a low stakes theme and i actually think the exact one was no spice theme but everybody equated that to Lexi's cozy fantasies i was very much campaigning for the spell shop and at one some people were like oh like i've never even tried this kind of book before and every single person who at least i spoke to was like my heart did not know i needed to read this as badly as i did yes and i that's been very much the reaction that i've heard when people are getting into cozy fantasy where it's like i don't really know what to expect of this and then they read it and it's like oh i didn't need a hug like this i think it's at the end of the day the definition of a cozy fantasy whatever else is in

40:52the ingredients is it feels like a warm hug for the reader and i think we all could use a few extra warm hugs right now right and going back to that connection too and feeling like that a warm hug from ourselves a warm hug from our community warm hug from the author telling us that it's going to be okay and i love that so much and i do think that house in this really and see has that warm hug but it also has a little bit of that like yeah you're doing too you do that for short or oh yes yes it's like yeah but it's like a it's with so much happiness right at the same time it's very strange to explain it's not like dystopia i promise where it's like yeah kind of thing anyway looks you have you read the sequel to the house in this relevancy i have somewhere beyond the sea and i what i loved about that was it was in the other main characters yes you i loved it i loved the book i didn't love it as much as i loved the first one because i did feel very complete

41:54after the first book but i loved the sequel and i haven't read tj clune's other books but i really want to i've heard amazing things i think he does a really great job of weaving a beautiful message into these cozy fantasies because that is something i have noticed is there's kind of two types of cozy fantasies one is a little bit more low stakes just what it's supposed to be very coasting and lovely and that and has all those messages and then there are the other ones that i think of the house in serenity irregular witches magical in keeping that has a very powerful message in there as well for ourselves for a society that is woven in with the warm hug and yeah and i those ones in particular are going to be my all time favorites if you want to dive into another one of his books i highly recommend under the whispering door i will say like content warning or trigger warning that it does deal with kind of grief and death and dying as an overarching

42:55plot point so just so you know going into it but that book is another one that hit me in a way that i didn't know i needed i very well use that yes i actually have the audio to it i just haven't listened to it yet so it's on my tbr i want in particular well while we're just talking about books i got one that's about a cat shelter a mystical cat shelter mystical cat shelter tell me more the book is called agnus operts i think i'm pronouncing that correctly mystical cat shelter and it's by Heather faucet who's also the author of Emily wilds encyclopedia affairs i hadn't read that one either but i'm saying i really want to yeah so Heather is definitely on my cozy fantasy author tbr list oh my gosh we have that same tbr list because i've heard about the encyclopedia affairs so many times and i don't know why i just got to get to it you do yeah i love them so much lexy before we go i must admit especially for those of you who might be hearing me talk for the first time today i love a little bit of chaos and i specifically love questions that incite a

43:57little bit of chaos so i would love to ask you one that has absolutely nothing to do with books and i want to know what you think we got to hash this out okay now here's the question is a hot dog a sandwich lexy help us settle the debate no oh really no are you oh guys i mean you just looked at me like i my answer is automatically right which it is but i defer to you to defend your no tell me well yes technically there are one side of bread and another side of bread with some meat in the middle sorry not waiting for this to not sound like a sandwich but first of all the best part about the hot dog is that the bread is connected so i guess other parts of it okay scratch that new object don't scratch it she's defending my argument no okay so there's no i'm trying um it's just not it's just not i don't even know how to have a rebuttal just not just

44:59shut the door Jess it's not no i think about certain things that i mean what would you call a taco i guess that's not that's bread though never mind i'm just not i'm just literally dicking myself a hole here aren't you are i think that maybe i think that a sandwich is simply carb carb not carb so yes bread bread meat or even if it's connected the but i think a taco is sandwich adjacent because it's some form of carbohydrate holding the filling i want to eat but it's not closed the whole way okay so let's consider this like the dragon category here where a wyvern is a dragon but a dragon is not automatically a wyvern right right so technically am i saying now that no i don't want to say that a hot dog is a sandwich i just will not say that i was waiting for you to realize that you were in fact defending me again and you were like no

45:59it's just hot dogs are just the wyverns of dragons sure i mean like no that that's the technicality but in my brain wyverns and dragons are very different and so therefore hot dogs and sandwiches are very different that is my argument i suppose all right well at henceforth i give you no more permission to eat any sandwich with connected bread because you have decided that that catapult sit out of the sandwich category no hogis or some say i actually have hogis that were waiting to bake from in the freezer right now and i have these meatballs and i was so excited to make a meatball sandwich and i was like talking about it's like oh shoot i actually literally have connected bread that i'm planning on eating in the very near future yeah with shaped meat laxie you're going to go ahead and tell me that a meatball sandwich is not super similar to a hot dog yes yes i've just said that for the sake of staying cozy i'll let you live in that reality you're right this is a chaos question welcome to my life i love it wait till you hear the other ones that i'm saving for all future

47:05people who meet me in this cozy corner of the internet i'm so excited i'm so excited laxie thank you so much for being here to chat about our shared love of cozy fantasy what a hoot thank you thank you to all of you for coming in to join us as well hopefully you're off to discover this genre or read some more cozy fantasy books a quick reminder to go ahead and check out the fantasy fan club in the link in the description and if you're interested in checking out other shows in the network be sure to give fantasy fanfellas a try it's a super fun podcast hosted by Hayden producer of fantasy fangirls and book talk star Stephen Walker and let me i'm just telling you you've got to go you got if you're not reading Mistborn first of all let's correct that issue and then head over to fantasy fanfellas it is so fun and they have been deep diving Mistborn which is why i'm telling you you have to go read it although they're in the second book at the time of this recording well of ascension you can also follow fantasy fan reads on social media as well as myself your lovely host the lost books of Jess this is a new podcast also so please take some time to rate and review it

48:10helps us so so much and share this podcast with your friends who also might love all things cozy yes thank you so much for having me Jess yeah you're so welcome Lex you're welcome back anytime in the cozy corner of the internet oh i'm sure i might want to come back once or twice yeah oh wow it oh wow it bye bye with no fees or minimums on checking accounts it's no wonder the capital one bank guy is so passionate about banking with capital one if he were here he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums he'd also talk about how most capital one cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs yep even on weekends it's pretty much all he talks about in a good way what's in your wallet terms apply see capital one dot com slash bank capital one n a member fd i c howdy howdy ho and welcome to fantasy fanfellas i'm Hayden producer of the fantasy fangirls podcast and your resident lover of all things sanderson and i'm steven your bookish

49:13internet goofball but you can call me the smash daddy and we are currently deep diving Brandon sanderson's fantasy epic misborn but here's the catch steven here has not read misborn before that's right hey hey so each week you'll get my unfiltered raw reactions to every single chip and along the way we'll do character deep dives magic explainers and steven will even try to guess what's next spoiler alert he'll be wrong news flash i'm never wrong episodes come out every Wednesday and you can find fantasy fanfellas wherever you get your podcasts